Info about me and my books; miscellaneous musings

Lucy: Part II (featuring Pip)

Lucy has become a regular diner at our back deck. She’s even been inside a couple of times, and my wife has set up a nice little covered area where she can sleep and eat. It’s been raining a lot lately, so it’s not unusual to find Lucy tucked away in the corner of the deck when we come home from work or poke our heads out the door in the morning.

Our attempts to find the kittens have not been fruitful, although it’s been a good way to get to know the neighbors on both sides of the street. The most interesting of these encounters was when we crossed the street. We looked behind the “abandoned” house, where we found an unlikely pile of stuff, including an old sofa, an upright piano, four or five shopping carts, and a van full of cardboard boxes (front seats included). The deck seemed like a promising place for a litter of kitties to be hiding, but we didn’t want to be that nosy or intrusive. We checked instead with the woman next door, who was audibly trying to corral three small children into her car. We distracted her while the youngest boy ran up and down the alley, throwing himself to the ground in paroxysms of giggles. She said the cat was known to her and the kids, but they didn’t know she had kittens. We finally went back home so she could catch her boy and strap him into the car.

Interviews with the neighbors indicate everybody knows Lucy, but no luck with the kittens… not until yesterday, when one came wobbling up the back lawn. My wife was so excited, she scared it away. My wife dubbed the fuzzy baby “Pip,” after the kitten in the wonderful anachronistic “Laugh Out Loud Cats” comic by a young artistic genius who calls himself Apelad.

We expect Pip will be back, along with any siblings s/he has. Angela will be on the lookout while I attend the Minnesota SCBWI conference, but it’ll be tempting to call home once an hour and see if we’re a 5-cat family. Stay tuned.